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A Gazan Rocket Reaches 6 Miles Into Israel

GAZA, Wednesday, July 5 — Defying Israel's troop advances into the Gaza Strip, Palestinian militants lobbed a rocket unusually deep into Israel on Tuesday, hitting an empty high school in Ashkelon and further infuriating the prime minister, Ehud Olmert, who called it "an escalation of unprecedented gravity."

The Israelis responded early Wednesday with an airstrike that caused extensive damage to the Interior Ministry in Gaza City.

At least two Palestinians were wounded in the attack, the second in recent days, Palestinian security officials said.

The renewed violence came after an ultimatum imposed by Palestinians holding an Israeli soldier passed early Tuesday with no sign that his status had changed.

While Palestinians in Gaza have frequently fired homemade rockets a short distance into Israel, Ashkelon is about six miles from the border. Though the outskirts have been hit occasionally, this was the first time the center of the city was, Israeli officials said.

The militant Hamas organization called the attack a response to "Israeli aggression."

But in a statement on Tuesday evening, Mr. Olmert called it "an escalation of unprecedented gravity in the campaign of terror waged by Hamas, which leads the Palestinian Authority."

Earlier Tuesday, Mr. Olmert traveled almost to the edge of the Gaza Strip, making a brief unannounced visit to Sderot, the primary target for Palestinian rockets.

The rocket fire has persisted even though Israeli troops have edged several hundred yards into northern Gaza over the past few days to try to halt the attacks, or at least limit them.

Israeli forces are also at the southern end of Gaza, about 25 miles away, where the captured soldier, Cpl. Gilad Shalit, 19, is believed to be held.

Photo

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert speaking Tuesday at a Fourth of July party at the American envoy's residence.Credit
Pool photo by David Furst

In a speech in Beersheba, in southern Israel, Mr. Olmert rejected the Palestinian ultimatum and said: "We will not conduct negotiations with terror elements. We will not allow anyone to think that kidnapping is an instrument to bring the State of Israel to its knees.

"This is a long war that requires a lot of patience."

The Palestinian prime minister, Ismail Haniya, who is from Hamas, urged the militants to keep Corporal Shalit alive and continue indirect negotiations, which have been handled by Egyptian envoys.

The three Palestinian factions holding the soldier had set a deadline of 6 a.m. Tuesday (11 p.m. Monday, Eastern time) for Israel to begin releasing Palestinian prisoners, threatening unspecified consequences for the soldier, who was captured June 25. The implication was that they might kill him, but the captors left that unclear.

"Whether he will be killed or not killed, we will not disclose any information," said Abu al-Muthana, a spokesman for the Army of Islam, one of the factions.

But he also said: "We do not kill captives. Our Islam requires that we treat captives well and fairly."

Yet a young Israeli settler in the West Bank, Eliyahu Asheri, 18, who was also captured last week, was executed with a single bullet to the head and his body was found in a shallow grave. The Popular Resistance Committees, another of the groups holding Corporal Shalit, took responsibility for killing Mr. Asheri.

In addition to the incursions into Gaza, Israeli forces surrounded a Palestinian police building on Tuesday in Ramallah, in the West Bank, and arrested three militants affiliated with the Fatah movement, who were also believed to be involved in the abduction and killing of Mr. Asheri. The Israelis said a fourth militant had been arrested earlier.

After the 6 a.m. deadline expired, the Israeli interior minister, Roni Bar-On, warned Hamas on Israel Radio that if the soldier was harmed or killed, "The sky will fall on them."

Israel has suggested that it may kill leaders of Hamas if Corporal Shalit is not freed. Hamas, a radical Islamic faction considered by Israeli to be a terrorist organization, is in charge of the Palestinian Authority, and its military wing is the third faction involved in the capture of the soldier.

Osama al-Muzaini, a Hamas political leader, said the three militant groups were no longer talking with Egyptian mediators.

Photo

After a Palestinian missile hit an empty school in Ashkelon, Israeli forces attacked buildings in Gaza, aided by a surveillance blimp.Credit
The New York Times

But Saeb Erekat, a prominent Palestinian official, said the Egyptian government was still involved in the negotiations, though he added, "Israeli violations on the ground lessen chances of reaching a final compromise."

On Tuesday morning, Israeli armored vehicles moved into another part of northern Gaza, near Beit Lahiya. A day earlier, Israeli forces moved into the northeast corner of Gaza, near Beit Hanun, a farming community. They have advanced only several hundred meters and have not entered heavily populated areas.

Youths in Beit Lahiya climbed to the rooftops of their five-story apartment buildings to see how far the Israelis had advanced toward their town.

A few Israeli vehicles were visible in the distance. Israeli artillery fire, directed at open areas in northern Gaza, maintained a steady thunder. A white blimp, used by the military to provide aerial images, hovered overhead. Pilotless drones and Israeli fighters also passed by.

"We expect the Israelis to come at any time," said Yahiya Shabat, 18. "We are used to this."

A few families in the cluster of tan stucco apartment buildings have already left in anticipation of an Israeli incursion, but most are staying put for now, he said.

Large Israeli troop contingents have entered the area frequently over the past five years in response to the Palestinian rocket fire, though not since Israel withdrew from the territory last summer.

Mr. Shabat estimated that his family had moved out of their apartment 10 times in recent years, usually for a couple of days at a time, when the Israeli forces moved into Gaza.

Israeli troops also entered the Palestinian side of the Erez border crossing, forcing it to close. Few Palestinians have been allowed to cross Erez in recent months, but aid workers, diplomats and journalists still use the crossing to go in and out of Gaza.

Overnight, an Israeli airstrike killed at least one militant in northern Gaza. Israeli aircraft also bombed an empty building at the Islamic University in Gaza City.

While many countries have criticized the Palestinians for seizing the Israeli soldier, Israel has also come under fire for some of its actions, like bombing Gaza's only power station, which has led to electricity rationing.

Jacob Dallal, an Israeli military spokesman, said the power plant was a legitimate target that was hit "to disrupt the infrastructure of those involved directly or indirectly in the kidnap of Corporal Shalit."

Greg Myre reported from Gaza City for this article, and Steven Erlanger from Jerusalem.

A version of this article appears in print on , on page A6 of the New York edition with the headline: A Gazan Rocket Reaches 6 Miles Into Israel. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe